In Ridley Scott’s “Body of Lies,” you can bet each man’s endearment comes with caveats.

The tagline for the thriller, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe, is “Trust No One. Deceive Everyone.”

So be prepared to plunge into the murk of intelligence work, where relationships are painfully provisional and enemies can serve a vital purpose.

There’s a chess match at the chilly heart of “Body of Lies.” In fact, there are enough matches going on that it resembles one of those days in a park where table after table hosts adversary upon adversary.

The presumed masters of their universes are CIA vet Ed Hoffman (Crowe) and Hani Salaam (Mark Strong) who is head of Jordan’s General Intelligence Department.

DiCaprio is Ferris, a boots-on-the-ground intelligence operative working in the Middle East. Often, Hoffman treats Ferris as a chess piece.

But which one? He’s certainly no pawn.

The bearded American has a sense of his value and an arguably naive notion he’s his own man. He speaks Arabic. He has a deft feel for cross-cultural rules of engagement — though an outrageously facile love story plopped into the mix suggests otherwise.

Still, parts of the job are beginning to gnaw at Ferris in ways Hoffman doesn’t grasp, or worse, doesn’t have time for.

So what? Fewer bad guys get sacrificed in the hunt for badder guys.

After a disastrous mission, Ferris is made head of the post in Amman, Jordan. This is where he meets Salaam.

“What have you heard about this place?” the elegant Salaam asks Ferris when they meet. “That they call it the fingernail factory.”

The nattily dressed Hani has a very simple rule for his new American friend: “never lie to me.” Simple, except for the line of work they’re in.

Surprisingly late in the story, Ferris hatches a plan to lure terrorist leader Al-Saleem (Alon Abutbul) out into the open. With the help from a high-tech specialist (Simon McBurney), Ferris hijacks a Jordanian’s identity, gussies it up to make it appear he’s the next Osama bin Laden, or in this case the next Al-Saleem.

It turns out that ideology — even the true-believer kind — isn’t ego-free.

Secrets, lies and the liars that tell always provide a vast region for movie-makers to roam.

Does Scott traverse it with any ambitions beyond mere diversion? Scott and screenwriter William Monahan use a lot of firepower to deliver an idea-skimpy thriller. This comes as a surprise given that the movie is based on a novel by Washington Post journalist David Ignatius.

It’s OK, maybe even ethically necessary, to want something more, something serious (or at least cathartic) from movies that toy and torment with images of terror and torture.

Terrorism flicks should not become just another genre, like mob movies.

Which brings us to DiCaprio. Martin Scorsese understands and continues to provide rich settings for the actor’s gifts.

Unfortunately, this is a Ridley Scott movie. While that works for Crowe, it leaves DiCaprio looking a little out of place.

Early on, he looks too young, too soft for the work Ferris does. He finds his rhythm when he flirts with an Iranian nurse (Golshifteh Farahani). The unlikely love story may make DiCaprio more believable. But it’s a clumsy sidetrip that makes the movie foolish.

Crowe gives Hoffman a good-ole-boy twang and a nice home in the D.C. suburbs. He makes Hoffman’s situational amorality palpable. But it doesn’t take long to be dulled to scenes of his secured-line chatter with Ferris. There he is raking leaves from his pool. There he is taking his daughter to soccer. There he is munching a bowl of cereal. All the while Ferris calls from crowded, dusty, fraught locations.

But once you grasp the notion he’s comfy-cozy stateside and seldom ventures to the countries he’s tinkering in, there’s not much more to learn.

Scott is one of those directors whose lesser films never look or feel exactly that. And “Body of Lies” often moves with visual force and occasional flair. A scene of a low-level Al Qaeda operative pedaling his way back to Amman on a bike while a motorcade of black security vehicles leaves him in the dust is amusing.

No one, except Strong, goes deep. His turn as Hani doesn’t make the Jordanian likable. But it does make him powerfully watchable.

“Body of Lies” is an A-list project with B-game results. The movie might be set in the Age of Jihad. But the rules of trust and mistrust are wholly familiar.

Film critic Lisa Kennedy: 303-954-1567 or lkennedy @denverpost.com. Also on blogs.denverpostcom/ madmoviegoer

“Body of Lies”

R for strong violence including some torture, and for language throughout. 2 hour, 8 minutes. Directed by Ridley Scott; written by William Monahan; from the novel by David Ignatius; photography by Alexander Witt; starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Russell Crowe, Mark Strong, Golshifteh Farahani, Oscar Isaac, and Simon McBurney. Opens today at area theaters